Fall Down, But Get Back Up.
We all think of ourselves in terms of our achievements and failures, our high points and the points we'd rather not expose to the light of day. We define ourselves depending on what we've gained and how long it took for us to get it, or how quickly we lost it all with one little misstep.
But most of the time, we lose the realization that we're only human.
We're not Superman or Wonder Woman, immortal or godly. We are blood and flesh, with bones like splinters and minds so easily corrupted by one stray pinprick of anarchy. We will always make mistakes, and it's not the end of the world when we do happen to do something that we probably should have taken more time to consider.
When people make mistakes--or at least, when I make mistakes--I consider past errors and ask myself, Did I fail more this time? I tend to make a compiled list in my thoughts, blotting out whatever mistakes don't take first place. And then I focus all of my pessimism, all of my self-hate and self-pity and other disgusting human emotion onto the biggest fuck-up I've made like a concentrated beam of light, and forget everything else in an attempt to burn the memory of my slip-up into my soul.
I think that's where we're lacking, where we've grown weak and soft and pathetic. Less. People say animals are the lesser species, but in terms of Mark Twain's The Lowest Animal, I'm beginning to think maybe we have it all wrong, like a pair of pajama pants put on backwards in the dark. I mean, do other animals hold grudges like we do? Will your pet dog remember being left outside while you were in the shower and resent you for it until you apologize? Will a lion regret eating a baby zebra? They don't let the past bother them, because it's just that--the past. It's happened, and there's nothing you can do to change what happened then.
We should all try to fit into the mindset where mistakes are mistakes, and there isn't a classification system of What You Did That Ruined Your Life the Most. You forgot to do the dishes and you got caught banging your best friend's girl aren't mistakes to be taken and weighed in on a scale from one to ten, but just mistakes to come to terms with and grow from.
That... that is why mistakes are necessary in life. If you didn't cheat on your partner that one time and get caught, you wouldn't have known the fragility of a human relationship, or how important your significant other is in your life. If you never attempted suicide, you would never come to appreciate the beauty of life more and more often. This is where you need to sit back and stare at that proverbial glass of water, and decide whether or not you want to look at it half-empty or half-full. You can take every little error you've made in stride and say, One more under my belt, one more lesson learned or you can stew and grow bitter over what you've done, and let it consume you with self-hate so powerful and impenetrable that you begin to lose your sense of peace.
I sincerely hope you decide on turning to the sun and forgetting the shades of pessimism... even if it does take you some time to find those rays of warm light.